US created monsters: Zetas and Kaibiles death squads

TUCSON --The death squads of the Zetas, trained at the US School of the Americas, are now carrying out murders for Mexican drug cartels and hired as killers in Iraq. The Kaibiles, Guatemalan death squads trained by US Special Forces, are now responsible for murders and rapes in the Congo and around the world. In Mexico, US trained death squads attack and murder Indigenous Peoples, including the Zapatistas, struggling for dignity, autonomy and survival. The United States training of death squads and torturers is one of the most censored issues in the media.

Urging news reporters to report the facts, reader Swaneagle writes, "The following is critical under-reported urgent news. Zetas are mutinous Mexican army troops who graduated from School of the Americas. Hired by the cartels, they are directly responsible for an astounding rise in brutal, grisly killings, including many of the murders of women in Juarez, which are up to 75 this year.

"Zetas have also been hired as mercenaries in Iraq. The spread of the SOA template must be halted." Swaneagle adds, "I wonder how many follow the pattern of child soldiers in Africa."

"School of the Americas Watch is where I first came across the involvement of the Zetas with the cartels. Then I saw a website by Mothers of the murdered young women of Juarez accusing the Zetas of being involved in the torture killings of their daughters. The saddest part of all is that Guatemalan Kaibiles, notorious death squads trained by US Special Forces and known for disemboweling pregnant Mayan women in Guatemala and Chiapas at Acteal, also have been working for the cartels as many of them mutinied as well for more money.

"As one who has been studying, documenting, interviewing and writing about the plight of marginalized peoples and how so many are murdered with killers rarely apprehended, I have seen a pattern emerging targeting Indigenous, homeless, prostitutes, migrants, gays, any who are extremely poor and voiceless, where killers, when arrested and convicted, tend to be white males often extreme right wing Christian or lifers in the military or white supremacist. I call them amerikkkan death squads," Swaneagle writes.

"I am concerned about the growing death squads that have direct ties to the US military and how they commit egregious crimes against humanity, especially to women and girls. What has happened in Africa, is unfolding in Mexico rapidly and heading our way."

Wikipedia states, "... More recently, some former members of the Kaibiles (along with members of the Mara Salvatrucha, MS-13 street gang), have formed relationships with the Los Zetas mercenary group. Los Zetas are a group of elite Mexican anti-drug paratroopers and intelligence operatives who deserted their Special Air Mobile Force Group in 1991 and have since been hired as enforcers'" by the drugs traffickers of the Gulf Cartel."

The Zetas' original group -- the Grupo Aeromóvil de Fuerzas Especiales (Special Forces Airmobile Group, GAFE) -- is a special forces unit of the Mexican Army's Special Forces Corps, trained by the world's special forces. They are responsible for attacks on the Zapatistas in southern Mexico. Mayan Zapatistas are struggling in Chiapas for dignity, autonomy and survival as corporations, military and paramilitaries push them off their land and murder those who resist. GAFE's agents of COIFE, considered Mexican Green Berets, Grupo Aeromóvil de Fuerzas Especiales del Alto Mando carry out black ops and are known as the (High Command GAFEs,) according to Wikipedia.

In Fort Benning, Georgia, the US School of the Americas Watch continues to protest the torture training of Latin American leaders who carry out the heinous crimes. In conjunction, protesters at Fort Huachuca's US Army Intelligence Center and School demand a halt to torture training. The "No to Torture" movement has exposed the role of Fort Huachuca, located in southeastern Arizona, in publication of the SOA's first torture training manual, made public in 1996. During the Iraq war, Fort Huachuca also trained army personnel responsible for the torture of detainees at Abu-Ghraib.

In Tucson, a weekend to end torture will be held Nov. 14 - 16, 2008, beginning with a talk by Col. Ann Wright, author of Dissent: Voices of Conscience. Col. Wright is a retired US Army Reserves colonel, with 29 years of military service and a career US diplomat. She resigned from the diplomatic corps in March 2003 in opposition to the invasion and occupation of Iraq. She was in the news recently when Canada denied her entry.

Featured during Tucson's weekend to halt torture is the Theater of the Oppressed, a live performance of Nightwind by Hector Aristizabal. Torture survivor Aristizabal is a native of Medellin, Colombia and currently living in Pasadena, CA.

"His commitment to human rights forced him to leave his country due to death threats. Hector's main work has been on the use of Theater of The Oppressed techniques, traditional myths and storytelling as a way to combine theater, drumming, and dance with psychotherapy as a way to address the healing needs of many of our communities. He is a survivor of torture and active in SOA Watch," Tucson organizers said. Following the theater, there will be a "No to Torture Candlelight Procession," to the federal building downtown, followed by a vigil.

The "No to Torture Rally," on Sunday, Nov. 16, will be followed by a procession and presence at the Ft. Huachuca main gate Veterans Memorial Park at 3105 E. Fry Blvd in Sierra Vista. There will also be a presence at one of the private contractor's offices nearby. The events are sponsored by Southwest Witness, Tucson SOA Watch, and Torture on Trialin solidarity with SOA Watch and their annual Vigil & Action at Ft. Benning.

The connection between the Zetas and US training at the School of the Americas has been exposed by some mainstream media. Jerry Zeper, at the Washington Times, writes, "Many of the Zeta leaders have been identified by Mexican officials as former members of an elite paratroop and intelligence battalion known as the Special Air Mobile Force Group, formerly assigned to the state of Tamaulipas, which borders southern Texas, to fight drug traffickers."Several of them, according to the Mexican government, were trained at the School of the Americas in Fort Benning, Ga. The school, now known as the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation, is the U.S. Army's principal Spanish-language training facility for Latin American military personnel."A core of 31 former battalion members are thought to lead the Zetas, but the gang's total membership is not known. The name Zeta was taken from the Mexican federal police in Tamaulipas, who used it in the late 1980s as radio code to locate high-ranking battalion commanders."Several members deserted the Special Air Mobile Force Group in 1991, aligning themselves with drug traffickers and establishing their own smuggling routes into the United States."

About Brenda Norrell

Biography:

Brenda Norrell has been a news reporter in Indian country for 33 years. She is publisher of Censored News, focusing on Indigenous Peoples, human rights and the US border. Censored News was created after Norrell was censored, then terminated, by Indian Country Today after serving as a longtime staff reporter. Now censored by the mainstream media, she previously was a staff reporter at numerous American Indian newspapers and a stringer for AP, USA Today and others. She lived on the Navajo Nation for 18 years, and then traveled with the Zapatistas. She covered the climate summits in Cochabamba, Bolivia, and Cancun, Mexico, in 2010.

User login

Navigation

About Brenda Norrell

Brenda Norrell has been a news reporter in Indian country for 33 years. She is publisher of Censored News, focusing on Indigenous Peoples, human rights and the US border. Censored News was created after Norrell was censored, then terminated, by Indian Country Today after serving as a longtime staff reporter. Now censored by the mainstream media, she previously was a staff reporter at numerous American Indian newspapers and a stringer for AP, USA Today and others. She lived on the Navajo Nation for 18 years, and then traveled with the Zapatistas. She covered the climate summits in Cochabamba, Bolivia, and Cancun, Mexico, in 2010.